Goodbye New York, for now-uh

thegirlinthecafe 5 Comments

I really want to stay in New York. Really. Stay.

I know why. Because it is a place away from daily routines, work, life and responsibilities. I know that if I would move here (the thought has struck my mind more than once lately) it would lose its magic. And then I would miss London. It’s like having two lovers. So the best way to solve this I guess is to go here once a year. That way the love and passion for New York will remain just that while London will be my faithful friend. Isn’t that how it works in real life too?

Some photos coming up tomorrow. See you in London.

New York, I think I’ll stay

thegirlinthecafe 4 Comments

I walked the Brooklyn Bridge, which should be number one on your list of things to do if you ever get to New York. It is amazing, the view on Manhattan is astonishing. And with a bit of sunshine, blue sky and white clouds, it’s wonderful.

I made lots of feathered friends on Pier 17. They loved me unconditionally. Because I had a blue berry muffin. How amazing is it to be able to sit outside in the sun for a while, watching the river, in the middle of November?

I also sat on Woody Allen’s bench and recreated one of the most beautiful scenes of his “Manhattan” in my head while I sat and watched Queensboro bridge.
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Take me to the bridge

thegirlinthecafe 4 Comments

It rained yesterday, nearly all day. But as you know rain doesn’t really bother me, and with an M&S umbrella I managed to stay dry most of the time. The only thing that is a bit hard in the rain is taking pictures. So I did some indoor shopping (Cup cakes should come with a serious warning), bought the obligatory pair of Levi’s (which really are ridiculously cheap if you are used to London prices) and did a lot of walking.
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Hello New York

thegirlinthecafe 5 Comments

New York is familiair but different. I know London well now, walking around in a big city is fine, but I can feel that I am more alert walking around in New York. And New York is different. It’s good, it keeps my eyes open, it makes me more aware and it makes me want to grab my camera all the time. I love that feeling.

It has been a very long day, it’s 22.33 now, local NY time, that’s 3.33am London time. I forced myself not to go to bed too early in order to quickly adjust to the New York time schedule.

Unfortunately both (!) my theatre plays have been cancelled due to a big strike on Broadway (about everything is cancelled on Broadway, has been for some days, and will be for some days to come). I am not too sad about it, I would have loved to see Kevin Kline but there is enough to see here and I am just really(!) grateful they didn’t strike when I came here to see The Vertical Hour last time.

I just came back from the cinema and saw American Gangster. Russell Crowe is not convincing, Denzel Washington on the other hand is cracking in this one.

I haven’t been too far around yet, but walked on Broadway and winked to both the Empire State Building (which is lit in blue at the moment, my favourite colour) and the beautiful Chrysler building.

Need some sleep now so will roll into my bed, which isn’t that far a roll, I am typing this from behind a free internet pc in my hotel.

Good night from New York.

London » New York

thegirlinthecafe 7 Comments

Packed suitcase.
Charged batteries.
Loaded iPod with the right tunes and voiciliciousness.
2 paper notebooks and a couple of pens.
Camera.
Passport, plane ticket and theatre ticket reservations (let’s see what happens).
Credit card.
The need to relax and be away for a couple of days.
2 lucky coins in my pocket.
I am ready.

Irregular posting the next couple of days, but I surely will write from the Internet cafe in 23rd Street, just around the corner of the Empire State building.

See you in New York.

Bye IJsselstein, Hello London

thegirlinthecafe 8 Comments

For a very short moment. No long post this time, but photos with short captions in stead which should give some sort impression of how the weekend has been.

I need to unpack and pack for tomorrow. It was nice coming home to a fantastic postcard that has been travelling since the 2nd of October and finally seemed to have found me this weekend. (Royal Mail keeps amazing me, and not in a good way). And there was more good stuff in my postbox, a DVD and a CD all related to that man, and send by the same kind person that send me other things. I need to think about a something good to send back to that person, because it is nearly too much to accept all this.

Step inside for the pictures, then I will continue to sing along to The Police – Every breath you take.

Oh, and the Girl is going to Dubai. Isn’t that cool?

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Going Home

thegirlinthecafe 7 Comments

I am off to the Netherlands for a couple of days. To eat my mothers Bangers & Mash, a dutch film version of Love Actually (oh yeah), visits to my old Grand parents (they are 89 and 93, but don’t tell them I wrote “old” because they are not, according to themselves) and the rest of my family.

I know from experience that I won’t have time to write, so unless something extraordinary happens (like meeting Mr. Scrummylicious in a Dutch snack bar, I mean I got the stardust now remember) you won’t hear from me until Tuesday where I will shortly touch base in London before heading off to New York.

In the mean time you can have a look at Charlie, decide if you are going to pick up the last extremely-limited-edition-due-to-be-a-collectors-item-cards or just stay put till I am back.

Have a great weekend.

Stardust and a close encounter

thegirlinthecafe 6 Comments

Charlie Cox and Claire Danes in Stardust
Charlie Cox and Claire Danes in Stardust

I saw Stardust some weekends ago. Overhyped maybe, but I loved it. It’s a fairy tale with humour. Don’t let big names like Michelle Pfeiffer and Robert de Niro put you off, there are enough Brits in it to make it worth seeing, and honestly Robert de Niro is playing a role I haven’t seen him play before (and he is a pirate, and we love pirates over here as you may have noticed). Ricky Gervais (who I still think is one of the funniest Brits around) is in it too, and despite being dressed up it just feels like he is playing either Andy Millman from Extras or David Brent from the Office. That doesn’t matter at all because he does that so well.

Other delights in this film: Nathaniel Parker (Inspector Lynley), the voice of Ian McKellen, Peter O’Toole, and new British cutie-pie of the year: Charlie Cox (hurrah for a daring casting director, brave enough to cast a relatively unknown actor, who happened to be pitch perfect for the role). The script has some beautiful British quirkiness as well. So yes, go see it.

I wrote the above some weekends ago but never got around to posting it, my editor didn’t find it interesting enough. I think he probably didn’t like the “cutie-pie” bit, he’s a bit sensitive sometimes, but I love him anyway.

Today I walked home from work. It was dark, it was rainy, it was late, I was tired and I passed the S&M cafe, and I thought – well why not. So I stepped in for another bangers and mash.

Trust me you really want to read the rest of this post…

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The Girl goes S&M

thegirlinthecafe 13 Comments

Bob and Mick on the wall.
Red seats.
Red and white checkered plastic cloth on the table.
4 types of mustard.
HP Sauce, salt, pepper, sugar and ketchup.
And S&M in a London mix on the plate right in front of me.
Kinky.

How many Britons points do I get for actually liking that?

If you want it too, you can get it here.
And this is what it looks like. I think that Dutch people generally will like it as we are as kinky with potatoes as the Brits are. Or so it seems.

Have you ever tried a bit of S&M?

Update: Here is the Dutch version (as my mother makes it that is) of S & M

It’s a new dawn, it’s a new day

thegirlinthecafe 14 Comments

Chance Street

I remembered this very well when I woke up this morning. And I was very tempted to stay in bed a good bit longer, in stead of packing my things and go to class. But that would be a weak thing to do, and whatever would happen, I would probably learn something from it one way or another, so I went.

I made sure to have a rescue plan in place though, I bought a ticket for Shadowlands for Monday. That way, when I would come home Sunday evening, utterly depressed from another disastrous weekend in screen writing class, I would be sure that Charles Dance would lift my spirits with his remarkable performance on stage.

So … I guess I wasn’t ready for it at all, but I went anyway.

If you like to know how my writing is going, step in. If not, come back tomorrow for something else.

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I want your Love, Actually on a postcard

thegirlinthecafe 19 Comments

It’s that time of the year again, and you know how I feel about it.

But the question is are you up for it again?

I will design a brand new Girl postcard, which I am going to have printed in a card shop in a special very limited edition. It is not going to be your typical Christmas card, there is no Christmas tree on it nor any other Christmas references. It’s probably going to be more of a New Year card to be honest, but I am not sure yet. It can be anything.

It will be a double card in full colour and there will probably be a quote of some sorts, you know the style. It is not going to be the image you see on the top of this post by the way.

Now, you want one of those extremely-limited-edition-due-to-be-a-collectors-item-cards won’t you?

Sold out!

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The Girl in the Cafe – the tour

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With recent sign ups from both Washington and Amsterdam (update: and London and Australia), there doesn’t seem to come an end to the travel of The Girl. She is heading for another US and UK tour soon.

The Girl has also been in New Zealand, visiting Mark, and has just visited Slovenia too.

Mark wrote a fantastic review. He saw the film with 16(!) of his friends and they all loved it.

Do step inside to read his review, it made me jump with joy. And I suddenly got a brilliant idea when I read it, I will tell you more about that soon.

A big Thank You to Mark for writing this.

Have a look at the worldmap here, and if you want to signup, please go here. It’s free, and the rules are easy:
See the film.
Write about it.
Pass i(t) on.

Love can’t change
what’s wrong in the world.
But it’s a start.

Step in and read Mark’s review

Good morning

thegirlinthecafe 2 Comments

Yesterday night I send off 51 pages of my script to my tutor.
I felt great when I send it and I thought:
“Eat this you moth…, you, you, you tutor!”
30 minutes later: “I think it was quite alright”
1 hour later “I hope it was alright”
2 hours later “Oh bloody hell, it’s crap isn’t it”
2.5 hours “Worst script ever”
3 hours later “I am not going to class on Saturday, no way”

So this morning I was late and I was tired and I might even have been a bit grumpy.
I closed the door behind me and started walking to work.

I met an old man.

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Posh Girl part II or me and my shoes

thegirlinthecafe 10 Comments

Yesterday I bought new shoes. I needed new shoes because I bought a suit (which I need for work). When the lady helping me measuring the length of my trousers (that’s standard here in London when you buy a suit, I didn’t know that, but learned something new) asked me if “those were the shoes I was going to wear with this suit”. I was about to say yes, when the look on her face told me that I probably wasn’t. I was wearing my Converse sneakers.

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Not everything is as it seems

thegirlinthecafe 9 Comments


Yesterday someone said to me “Oh I just follow your blog, then I will know how you are”.
Nice thought, but it doesn’t really work that way. I don’t write how I am on my blog, I write what I think might be interesting to read, for some more than for others (hello mum), I write what I would like to remember, and I write too much about Bill because I happen to like him.

But here are things that don’t make my Friday and some that do:

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Shadowlands, Wyndham’s Theatre London – review

thegirlinthecafe 9 Comments

Charles Dance in Shadowlands[rating: 5/5]
I have 7 plays lined up the coming months, but I doubt any of them will come even close to Shadowlands, which I saw yesterday.

Shadowlands tells the story of C.S. Lewis (writer of Narnia), a confirmed bachelor into his fifties, until he meets Joy, a witty, intelligent American woman who has been writing to him because she is a fan of his books. It is an incredibly tender and touching story, which shows that love is unpredictable and powerful.

Charles Dance (Bleak House, Gosford Park and longer ago he played the villain in The Golden Child with Eddy Murphy) plays C.S. “Jack” Lewis and he swept me off my feet. What a fantastic actor and what a performance, he got me hooked from the second he stepped into the light.
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